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In Chap. 4 , Chris Kennedy tracks the growing prominence of studies of cities in
the industrial ecology literature. Kennedy conceptualises that urban metabolism
studies are ‘scale-delineated’ components of wider socio-economic metabolism
studies, and he sees two main challenges for future work. One is to address questions such as what are the limits to effi ciency gains that can be achieved, for example, through closing material loops? This relates to the circular economy debate (see
Chaps. 7 (Stahel & Clift) and 13 (Hill)). The other, related, challenge concerns
industrial symbiosis, which is the subject of Chap. 5 (Chertow & Park) and Chap. 19
(Bailey & Gadd), and here Kennedy sees a need to explore how much potential
there is for industrial symbiosis in cities, with a focus on the limitations of urbanscale agglomeration effects.
In Chap. 5 , Marian Chertow and Jooyoung Park focus on industrial symbiosis,
one of the areas within industrial ecology that derives most obviously from the analogy with natural ecosystems. They describe this as a subfi eld of industrial ecology
which engages traditionally separate industries and entities in a collaborative
approach to resource sharing that benefi ts both the environment and the economy .
They start the chapter with a description of Kalundborg, the most famous and often
cited example of industrial symbiosis, and the rest of their chapter charts the
progress of industrial symbiosis worldwide. They conclude that while industrial
symbiosis has achieved a great deal in the last quarter century, much remains to be
done to understand the levels of material exchanges, institutional contexts, cultural
changes and people-to-people collaborations that will enable industrial symbiosis to
fl ourish worldwide.
Chapter 6 , by Tim Baynes and Daniel Mϋller, again picks up the theme of stocks
and fl ows in a whole-system perspective. Readers relatively new to industrial ecology are advised to read Chap. 4 (Urban metabolism) before embarking on Chap. 6 .
Increasing concentration of people in urban centres means that massive investment
is needed in urban infrastructure (i.e. stock) in the coming decades, particularly in
the ‘global South’. This will require enormous fl ows of materials, and there are serious questions over how this can be accommodated within the Planetary Boundaries.
Once the infrastructure is in place, society is ‘locked in’ to patterns of behaviour and
economic activity. Baynes and Mϋller explore how the industrial ecology approach,
drawing on the modelling approaches in Chap. 2 , can lead to models of socioeconomic metabolism which guide sustainable development by ensuring that the
time perspective is long term.
The importance of the lifetime of stock is also one of the themes in Chap. 7 by
Walter Stahel and Roland Clift. The idea of a ‘circular economy’, involving repeated
rather than ‘once through’ use of materials, is currently enjoying widespread discussion; indeed, it has been one of the central ideas in industrial ecology from the outset. Stahel and Clift explore how focussing on the use of stocks gives insights which
go beyond looking for circular fl ows, leading to the idea of a ‘performance economy’ which focuses on maintenance and exploitation of stock. The performance
economy emphasises business models directed at providing services rather than
selling material products and identifi es reuse and remanufacturing as key parts of
the economy. This represents a realisation of industrial ecology’s aspiration of
Introduction
In Chap. 4 , Chris Kennedy tracks the growing prominence of studies of cities in
the industrial ecology literature. Kennedy conceptualises that urban metabolism
studies are ‘scale-delineated’ components of wider socio-economic metabolism
studies, and he sees two main challenges for future work. One is to address questions such as what are the limits to effi ciency gains that can be achieved, for example, through closing material loops? This relates to the circular economy debate (see
Chaps. 7 (Stahel & Clift) and 13 (Hill)). The other, related, challenge concerns
industrial symbiosis, which is the subject of Chap. 5 (Chertow & Park) and Chap. 19
(Bailey & Gadd), and here Kennedy sees a need to explore how much potential
there is for industrial symbiosis in cities, with a focus on the limitations of urbanscale agglomeration effects.
In Chap. 5 , Marian Chertow and Jooyoung Park focus on industrial symbiosis,
one of the areas within industrial ecology that derives most obviously from the analogy with natural ecosystems. They describe this as a subfi eld of industrial ecology
which engages traditionally separate industries and entities in a collaborative
approach to resource sharing that benefi ts both the environment and the economy .
They start the chapter with a description of Kalundborg, the most famous and often
cited example of industrial symbiosis, and the rest of their chapter charts the
progress of industrial symbiosis worldwide. They conclude that while industrial
symbiosis has achieved a great deal in the last quarter century, much remains to be
done to understand the levels of material exchanges, institutional contexts, cultural
changes and people-to-people collaborations that will enable industrial symbiosis to
fl ourish worldwide.
Chapter 6 , by Tim Baynes and Daniel Mϋller, again picks up the theme of stocks
and fl ows in a whole-system perspective. Readers relatively new to industrial ecology are advised to read Chap. 4 (Urban metabolism) before embarking on Chap. 6 .
Increasing concentration of people in urban centres means that massive investment
is needed in urban infrastructure (i.e. stock) in the coming decades, particularly in
the ‘global South’. This will require enormous fl ows of materials, and there are serious questions over how this can be accommodated within the Planetary Boundaries.
Once the infrastructure is in place, society is ‘locked in’ to patterns of behaviour and
economic activity. Baynes and Mϋller explore how the industrial ecology approach,
drawing on the modelling approaches in Chap. 2 , can lead to models of socioeconomic metabolism which guide sustainable development by ensuring that the
time perspective is long term.
The importance of the lifetime of stock is also one of the themes in Chap. 7 by
Walter Stahel and Roland Clift. The idea of a ‘circular economy’, involving repeated
rather than ‘once through’ use of materials, is currently enjoying widespread discussion; indeed, it has been one of the central ideas in industrial ecology from the outset. Stahel and Clift explore how focussing on the use of stocks gives insights which
go beyond looking for circular fl ows, leading to the idea of a ‘performance economy’ which focuses on maintenance and exploitation of stock. The performance
economy emphasises business models directed at providing services rather than
selling material products and identifi es reuse and remanufacturing as key parts of
the economy. This represents a realisation of industrial ecology’s aspiration of
Introduction